Easy fish tacos with homemade tortillas

An easy meal that comes together in minutes, these fish tacos with homemade tortillas are a great way of getting the family to eat more fish. The fish is oven-baked in a spicy marinade and served in super soft and chewy homemade flour tortillas. Serve with lots of different toppings and let the family choose their favourites to build their own fish tacos at the table.

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The best fish tacos

Fish tacos are made with succulent, lightly spiced fish, served in soft chewy homemade tortillas, smothered in a tangy sauce, and piled high with a variety of toppings.

Everyone loves helping themselves to a soft, chewy tortilla, piling on the fish and choosing their own personal favourite toppings to make a delicious meal. And as long as you have a wide variety of toppings you are bound to have something that will appeal to everyone.

I love these fish tacos because they are perfect for an easy family supper and great to throw together for a casual meal when friends drop in unexpectedly.

All you have to do is marinate the fish in spices and olive oil for a few minutes then pop it into the oven for 20 minutes while you prepare the toppings and you are good to go. You can make your own tortillas if you have a few extra minutes (they are very quick to make) or you can save time and use shop-bought.

How to make fish tacos

**You can find the complete list of ingredients and full instructions for making fish tacos and homemade tortillas on the printable recipe card at the end of this post””

Let’s start with the fish.

• For the fish – I used haddock fillets, but you can use any firm white fish – cod, tilpia, hake or even pollock. Just make sure there are no bones in it, and remove any skin before baking.
• For the spices I used a mixtue of cayenne pepper, cumin, paprika and salt. The amount of cayenne pepper is a matter of taste – if you like spicy foods use extra, or tone it down a bit to suit your own taste.
• Butter and olive oil – the oil gets mixed with the spices and rubbed on to the fish, and the butter is dotted on top of the fillets before they are baked.

• Once you’ve rubbed the spices over the fish and dotted with butter, cover with a lid of tinfoil and let it stand for about 10 minutes to give the spices time to work their way into the fish.
• Then pop into hot oven (180C / 360F) for 20 minutes until the fish is cooked through and flakes easily when prodded with a fork.
• The actual baking time will depend on the thickness of the fish fillets. If they are on the thick side you may have to leave them a few minutes longer. Mine were quite thin and 20 minutes was ample.

Toppings for fish tacos

Everyone has their own favourite toppings. These are the ones I used, and I’ve included a few suggestions below for extra salads if you’d like to make a more substantial meal.

You could also add lime wedges and a dish of sour cream.

The sauce is very easy to make and goes very well with the fish. You can make it as mild or as spicy as you like. To make it you just mix 2 parts mayonnaise with 1 part tomato sauce (ketchup) and add as much hot sauce as your taste buds can handle. I used tabasco, but you can substitute this with Sriracha or any other hot sauce.

If you want to make a more substantial meal, you could add a few salads, such as my homemade coleslaw or a spicy corn salsa (recipe below). Or what about trying this fruity peach salsa made by my friend Chloe over at Feast Glorious Feast.

How to make corn salsa

To make a quick and easy corn salsa, just mix combine all these ingredients in bowl, cover and leave it in the fridge for a few hours to let the flavours develop.

• I small can (397g or 7 oz) sweetcorn kernels (drained).
• 2 tablespoons finely diced red onion
• 1 small finely diced tomato
• 1 small finely diced red or green chilli
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh coriander
• The juice of one small lime

Soft and chewy tortillas

A soft and chewy tortilla is the perfect vessel for holding the spicy fish and saucy toppings. I often find that store-bought tortillas can be dry and tasteless, so I prefer to make my own. And because they are so quick and easy to make there’s no excuse for putting up with sub-standard tortillas ever again.

Store and leftover tortillas in a large plastic bag or air-tight container in the refrigerator, and you can use them the next day to make wraps which you can pop into your lunch box. Ham and cheese, chicken mayo, or even any leftover fish make great fillings.

• Gather your ingredients.
  • self-raising flour – if you don’t have self-raising flour you can substitute with plain or all purpose flour and add one teaspoon of baking powder or baking soda (not bicarbonate of soda) to each cup of flour.
  • oil – I like to use sunflower oil, but you could use olive oil if you want a stronger flavour in your tortilla.
  • salt – not too much, half a teaspoon should be sufficient.
  • enough luke-warm water to make a soft dough.
• Mix everything together and knead until soft. Don’t add all the water at once, the amount you will need depends on the strength and absorbancy of the flour you are using. Start by adding about three-quarters of the water, mix the dough and add more water if you need it. You are looking for a very soft, non-sticky consistency that you can roll out easily.
• Let the dough rest for 15 minutes then divide it into 8 equally sized balls. Roll each ball out on a lightly-floured surface into a roughly circular shape that will fit into your frying pan. Try to roll as thinly as possible.
• Brush your frying pan with a little sunflower oil to lightly coat the base and then fry each tortilla for about 2 minutes per side until they firm up and hold their shape. You will find they tend to stay quite white, and don’t brown very much. Don’t use too much oil – a light coating is sufficient (I use kitchen towel to rub the oil onto the pan).

Pile the tortillas on top of one another as they come out of the frying pan.

To serve

Arrange the cooked fish on a bed of lettuce leaves, and place it on the table along with the tortillas and bowls of toppings, plus any additional salads you may be serving. Optionally add wedges of limes for squeezing over the top.

Let everyone help themselves to a tortilla and fill it with the spicy fish and a mixture of toppings.

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Frequently asked questions

Additional resources

Don’t forget to check out my handy Cookery Conversion Calculator if you want to convert any of your recipe measurements from grams to cups, ounces, tablespoons or millilitres and vice versa. You can also use the calculator for converting oven temperatures between Fahrenheit, Celsius and Gas marks.

If you live at a high altitude you may find you need to adjust your baking recipes to compensate for this. You can read all about it in this post on baking at high altitudes.

Pin for later

If you would like to make these fish tacos (or even just the homemade tortillas), why not pin this recipe to one of your Pinterest boards so you can find it again easily. Just click on the image below.

Other fish recipes

You may also like to try some of my other delicious fish recipes:

• Monkfish wrapped in Serrano ham with lobster risotto
• Cheesy fish pie with crispy topping
• Fish Milanese wih a buttery garlic and parsley sauce
• Easy fish curry in a tomato and onion sauce
• Spicy fish and rice bake in tomato sauce
• Homemade fish cakes with a crispy coating

The recipe

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